sound. holding all colors inside a light that was nothing but darkness. we are the memory of a breath that could not be but was. a breath that's well to bubble which bursts and collapsed. me are the memory gestated in day that lasted eons as the universe birthed heat, light, rock, ice, mineral, song, us. we are the impossible made flesh creating infinnate possibilities of hope or endless kazisms of despair inside the prayers which we have become. [applause]. this is called the fifth dying i deal with the wars away but the wars here. >> anny was one of many girls

my son mentioned in passing and grew up when she became the fifth intent days where he more than once broken bread or tossed a joke or waves down or waived past. she, the fifth, in 10 days who's blood splat erred the walls and dripped down the walk. this one in front of her home celebrating turning 23, a shining star her brother said. my heart, her father moneyed, a friend my opened to her sister known since the girl was 12 and he 11. and now each day i watch my son suck in his tears and stiffen from the pain that thickens as the pile of his dead grows

beneath his heart. deep inside his bones ache. and will not let him sleep lest those faces fill his dreams. i try to massage love into his neck and shoulder as we talk anguish from his locked muscles we don't speak of airny his pretend wife and confident. he reminds me it is not summer i should be real it can only get worse. he dresses in white and leaves my home as the key turns the bolt, i smell the mossy scent of morning seep from under the designer purfume he left in his wake. [applause]

>> this is, i have several poems in various solder's voices. some that i made up and some that exist this is for jessica lynch, war memories. i have forgotten myself. who i was, i cannot now know who i have become is a stranger i have forgotten myself there are other things to lose in battle eyes and guts, other sacrifices before life. vilost myself. i am not who i was before this war, i am not she who no longer dares to be my mother is so happy with this worn body returned home. we pretend that i am as whole as i look. but at night when i stair

through the dark at the hidden image in the mirror i cannot lie to the stranger i see. i have forgotten everything. except my affection for children, my service to country and my insatiable fear. [applause] >> sizing up the cost of war. >> what is left but the shoes. shoes scuffed and torn, no longer having feet to carry them, shoes empty now. work boots bearing mud from the last field he had plowed with his father. empty now. red sneakers with white stripes brought back fwr america by her

oldest son given to her youngest, both of them immediately rung outside kicking the soccer ball back and forth the older rustling the youngster's head after a goal, empty now. heavy and white, they were the first pair of shoes she ever walked in. the first she had learned to untie so that she could riggel out and once again feel the sand cyst between her toes, empty now. his work boots were resoled many times next season he would have bout a new pair or perhaps the season after that. but these old ones darkened from the oil had become supple and familiar. they knew his feet took his

ankles and kept them strong. empty now. she had smiled when he offered her the embossed letter pumps made for her in italy from the pattern he carefully traced around her narrow feet long toes tapered in perfect symmetry. empty now. regulation boots, smoothed by the sand salt crystal seeming to be so much of the desert they had walked. the inside soles showing imprints of thick, heavy feet. empty now. and these, handmade slippers that were the only a grand mother silk floured kiss that never touched the ground because as her father's favorite she was still carried every where. empty now. the red heals that she saved for

the brown loafers passed down the sandals strapd and tied all empty now. the flesh gone. the blood gone. the legs gone. all gone. [applause] >> everyday another infantary man choses not to fire his gun. everyday a solder refuses to pick up his weapon. evidence another matisha member boundaried post. everyday another fighter deserts instead of returning to the battlefield. everyday another youth conscious objects to the very idea of war. everyday another ordinary person

offers love instead of apathy, hope instead of despair, the cause of peace grows stronger. it is already begun. it's long trek into our hearts. tell take many more years to cover our streets, a host of decades to feel our roads, our access, our country side but itit will come like the clearest of mornings after the harshest storms like the soft soothing rain after the years of drought, it will come. hundreds of millions of people will stop feeding the beast of war. will stop crafting armor and boiling machines with their

children's blood sacrificed. thousands upon thousands of solders will turn away from their leaders doomsday aspirations. refusing the burden of being a destroyer of homes. rejecting the obligation of being the killer of brothers, spurning the mantel of murderer of children, decimator of families, poisoner of the earth. one day it will happen. on this tiny planet, flushed with blues weeping in reds opening green and fresh. tell be quiet on this day. so quiet it will pass almost unnoticed. because there will yet be hunger and floods and fire. there will yet be storms and despair and disease. there will yet be struggles and madness.

but when that morning come thousands upon thousands will get up, millions inside millions will stretch out and face the challenges of the moment with our tongues wrapped around the idea of peace. feel it's weight, hear it's song, remember in vent, discover, recreate it's rhythms as we begin to walk the long trail of healing. sew it to grow on it be it to see it, peace. sew it to grow it, be it to see it, peace. [applause]. >> flying inside the evening sky. i don't know the name of the

blues that shadow our past. one is sweet and light a cool meringue. another sharp but still. a third thick presses down upon the rest. colbolt. a blue that hums deeply a harmony of ferm ment denying stars shining inside the cosmos. forever blue where life dies and is reborn. an eternal blue that exists above the storm. a blue that doesn't suffer discord that would smile if it had a mouth. embrace if it was armed. comfort if it grew heart. instead it arcs a concert of blues hovering over the earth in an endless ocean of impossible quiet. thick with blue beyond blue. a blue that disappears when

clutched in the fist, a blue invisible and solid. thank you very much. [applause] >> please, welcome camill. >> that was a great reading and you changed up my play list. >> start with a poem i read after i learned that the rate of valum prescriptions in baghdad sky rocketed after the u.s. entry into that space. the title of the poem and it is the words the probably roost which is bitter. biting, cutting, sharp. bitan.

once, she was a fearest dark girl who's tongue skipped top of meeting. teeth, teeth top of mouth like double dutch with the word that ment her thoughts cutting circles through the day. no chance she'd be the one to trip and break rhythm. then she could sit all day on her porch memorizing the trees. she could be still. the birds, winged through leaves like they didn't know anyone could hurt them. once she believed steam curled off asphalt when summer rains stopped with a prophecy. she believed this looked the way she would feel after touching a

man. her body clean. and black. and right. something beautiful and painless rising up. i was talking with a friend about that idea of leaving places. and leaving places behind the title of this poem is stolen directly from this conversation in which he said there is a particular state that he would never go back to. >> that's a state i will never go back to. for doug. >> once i got over the problem of not knowing how i couldn't go back to not curbing my tires. it took a while to get past forgetting to register street cleaning hours and love, love was my handicap. though i had no permits to hang from my rear view so i collected

7 or 10 slips i had every intension to pay off except i skipped town for the summer. and returned to find the guy staying in my apartment toss them. i'll admit i was relieved not to face these expensive reminders of the girl i have been how stupid i was about life in the city. and as i finished school, was moving south for good this time. and as i lived then in a state of great anticipation. the potential of a record never acrossed my mind. but now, on account of those parking tickets i can't go back there with a car. though everyone who loves me know i love that tiny window each october in the south nub of the state you can't reach without driving. i missed it once and waited a

whole year regretting the lost chance to track the lyndon leaves tiny migration. the next fall, refusing to endure that state of desolation again i asked everyone who loved me to please meet me just south of the border. we ordered green mussels and popcorn shrimp. the shrimp beat the mussels to the table. i drank for pleasure but since i left that state i hadn't found anything delicious so iate all the mussels. crouched, later in that state betrayal that come from learning some green things are not good. considering the law averages that a body in motion stays in motion unless faced with an equal or opposite force, peer

pressure, skitology the projected near devastation of world forest should population the motdz of toilet paper consumption. germs vary. my role in the pressing the mean agent of common human hygiene i knew i never wanted to be near that state again. with extradition i was hardly away at all. when i first rolled over my parents were pleased and i left the state of never having rolled before. ditto, something on all fours to crawling. and once i could walk we all knew i was never going back. i just pulled myself up and started moving. i grabbed at everything i could reach until i learned better i put my tongue on anything.

once iate papaya straight from the tree and i mourned the abject state of created fruit i living in that state in my ignorance thought i loved. i denounce such love. i married a local. i taught myself how to keep his garden. i swear i'm staying away from that state for good. i heard this quote a while ago and i just loved it ever since. >> just before she died, gert trued stein was able to ask, what is the answer? she got no response. her last words were, in that case what is the question? it is not who is it, are we

there yet, is anybody home. not, how much for the lemon, not, how much for the ivory, leopard, the peach. not, when are we leaving. not, how will we leave. not, do you know who she came with? how many clowns will hit in the car. the head of a pin? no one cares how many angels. no one cares what you think of the smart bomb corruption, the mobs. your opinion on deregulation, no one's concerned much the question is not who done it the question is not what's for dinner, what's your beverage, where's the beef? the question is not who is your daddy? is not, which way will the wind blow? is not, where's the car. you wash behind your ears; right

. question is not did you turn off the oven or turn off the alarm what's that got to do with the price of tea in china. did you bite it. what's gotten into you no one's asking if you know where your children are. no one's asking if you can loca the nearest exits. in some cases they may be behind you. no one cares whether or not you are being followed. don't ask if it makes you look fat. the question is not, do you remember the time. do you remember the time? not, do you know the extension of the person you were calling. not, premium or regular. not paper, not plastic credit or deb debit. the question is not what can you do for your country. not now. not later. not okay? the question is not, what your

country can do for you. the question is not, who will save us. how are you getting by? [applause] >> i'll end with a love poem. >> my lover. who lives far. my lover who lives far away opens the door to my room and offers supper. in a bowl made of his breath. the stew has boiled and i wonder at the cat born from it's steam. the cat is in the bedroom now. muling. the cat is indecent and i whom trying to be tidy, i whom trying to do things the purpose way, i

who am sick from the shedding. i, am undone. my lover who lives far away opens the door to my room and offers pastry in a basket spun from his vision. it is closely woven. the kind of container some women collect. i have seen these in many colors but the basket he brings is simple. only black. only nude. the basket he brings is full of sweet burdens and i eat even the crumbs. as am i have not dined for days. my lover who lives far away opens the door to my room and offers tea made from the liquid he's crying. i do not want my lover crying and i am sorry i ever asked for

tea. my lover, who lives far away opens the door to my room pretending he never cried. he offers tea and cold cakes. the tea is delicious. spiced like the start of our courtship. honeyed and warm. i drink every bit of the tea and put aside the cakes. my lover who lives far away opens the door to my room like a man loving his strength. the lock i replaced this morning will not keep him away. my lover who lives far away opens the door to my room and brings me nothing. perhaps he has noticed how fat i have grown indulged.

perhaps he is poor and sick as emptying his store. it is no matter to me any longer he has filled me already so full. my lover who is far away opens the door to my room and tells me he is tired. i do not ask what he's tired from for my lover far away has already disappeared. the blankets are big with his body. the cat, under the covers because it is cold out and she is not stupid. muse. >> thank you. [applause]. >> please welcome mr. douglas kaerny. [applause] >> how many know the song living in the city by stevie

wonder. that great skit at end where stevie plays all the voices and gets arrested. new york city, skyscrapers and everything. this is a poem that reimagines that gentlemen exists the bus in that skit as john henry. this is a section of it. skyscrapers and everything. j hammer henry mallet [inaudible] could barely fit hammer poking out like natural man's skyscraper to the concrete for deep machine sleep abouts income. don't go john henry traffic man, don't go across that street. the flood song poems were poems written in reaction to katrina.

how can i enter that space of writing poems about that. i'm not from there and don't have family there. who benefits from that tragedy? who benefits from that disregard for humanity and the thought animals would benefit from that. this first poem is flood songs number 4 mosquitoes drinking didy. >> drink every hour next up this hour and every hour after. was born in the river there is enough to go around. drink every hour on the hour and every hour after. in the river there is enough to go around. drink every hour. there is enough to go around. drink every hour and every hour after. go to the river there is enough

to go around. drink up the hours and every after burned down by the river -- drink air land is here for after survivors go around they are enough. [applause] >> flood song 8 stray dogs duet. >> the every i learned. food. for the good. love. your hand smiled with me. you wanted me to understand you with -- my teeth. hunger seemed the only -- tongue we shared. the sky -- opened. closed it's door. the sky -- opens, closes it's

door. the sky -- hunger seems the only master. no, we both understand something like love. good doggie, good doggie what i do now. [applause] >> now you can feed pigeons and they know to go there to get food. sharks follow the ships because if you have humans packed and one gets sick you have to get rid of the sick one so it doesn't get the others sick you 3 them over board and the sharks follow. slim chance for [inaudible] it samples parliament, little mermaid.

ts eljot and robert haden. >> never learned to swim. but we sure can dive. over million ships -- over million ship. iowa woo. let your fish bones live old man. let your fish bones before man. make a wish the black fish there is company coming, coming. hammer heads ham or head until hammer fed company knocking. great white shark. great white georgia no, no. they company dining, dining. [inaudible] can't remember, can't remember. there is company [inaudible]. and all kn